Comic Review - Main Series #37 · 5:21am Dec 27th, 2015
Time to end the Siege of the Crystal Empire. It's been a bumpy ride, now will it crash and burn and achieve lift and soar majestically?
We open to the Crystal Empire abandoned and covered in shadows, and Twilight and Cadance are brought before Sombra. Yeah, seems the bit battle happened off-screen. Lame. The Umbrum are sentencing the two for treason as Sombra looks on, and they now insist he's called Emperor Sombra, along with Empress Hope. I don't want to try and understand how the royal system in Equestria works, but IMHO, King Sombra sounds just fine. The Umbrum agree to be lenient if they tell them the location of the other Mane Six, but they refuse. They then roll out Shining Armor and in a very awkward Star Wars homage, Cadance tells them the truth and they petrify Shining anyway. And I mean really awkward, as in word-for-word quoting of the scene from A New Hope. And why, because this is Part IV of the story arc? Pft.
Sombra prepares to petrify Twilight and Cadance next, but the two protest it should be a public demonstration in front of everyone to prove Sombra's power. The Umbrum fall for the obvious ploy, the derps, and tell Sombra to go get Hope so the citizens can see her in alliance with him. Sombra visits Hope's room and the two chat. Hope questions when Sombra's conquests will be over so they can just be together in peace, but of course Sombra is looking at Canterlot and beyond. Hope is still wounded from taking Twilight's attack, but refuses to let Sombra aid her, insisting she's an empress of monsters and can do it herself.
Sombra protests he had no choice in the matter, the vision of the Crystal Heart showed him his destiny, to be a weapon of the Umbrum. Hope points out the Heart also showed her as a Princess, but she abandoned her training to try and find a way to help Sombra. Sombra apologizes for costing her her crown, but Hope replies the point is she choice Sombra over her destiny, and she doesn't believe in destiny anyway. She believed in him, and look how that went. So it only took the conquest of the Empire and the destruction of Equestria's rulers to make Hope realize restoring Sombra and letting him release the Umbrum was a bad idea. Well, better three issues late than never.
Sombra and Hope emerge from the tower, and a cannon strikes one of the Umbrum. The Mane Six have rallied the citizens of Ponyville in attack, and slapstick comedy fighting begins. Best part, "Cutie Mark Crusaders Tank Unit!" with the CMC manning a red wagon armed with apple cannons and Apple Bloom in the driver's seat with an army helmet on. We also get a Discord cameo where he insists he's too busy bathing to help, but on Fluttershy's insistence he grows her animals to giant size so they can attack. Considering Sombra's choice of punishment for the Two Sisters, I would have thought more could be milked from Discord's role here, but it is what it is and this, sadly, is in-character for him. Also, Discord is reading a MLP comic in the bath.
The Umbrum insist that Sombra petrify Cadance and Twilight to make the rebels see there is no hope, but Hope has a better idea. She produces the Crystal Heart. If Sombra shatters it, the Umbrum can never be re-sealed. The tide of battle turns in the Umbrum's favor, and they insist Sombra destroy the Heart. Sombra looks in it and tells them how he saw himself as a monster the last time he looked in the Heart, but now he only sees his reflection. Sombra thanks Hope and levitates the Crystal Heart onto the dais, declaring that he shall choose his own destiny. The Umbrum are rapidly sucked back into the door and it seals again.
With Hope, Sombra is beginning to fade into shadow. Sombra tells Hope not to run, that she can do so much good in the world, and smiles that at long last, he got to see the Crystal Faire. Sombra turns into an orb of shadow and begins to be drawn away, but Hope uses her powers to hold him back, declaring she isn't ready to let him go. The other four Princesses combine their power with Hope's and in a very sudden transformation, Sombra is restored to pony form... purified of his shadow magic and looking like the good King Sombra from Reflections. And in case we didn't get it, a sign in the background in the middle of one panel says "Reflections -Custom Mirrors-."
The Princesses forgive Sombra, and he says he wants to restore Princess Amore; he shattered her into pieces, but if they can find them, perhaps he can restore her. And so the comic, and the four-part story, ends with Hope and Sombra departing on an adventure together, narration talking about how Sombra and Hope's love was able to help him redeem himself, when she saw the good in him that he couldn't.
This ending... it's weak. And it's a shame because I want to like it.
So, let's not just talk about the issue, but the overarcing plot. As I wondered all along, the villain team-up was a complete waste of time, none of them appear in this finale at all. They were there for fanservice and were very bad at it. All that was needed was Chrysalis, if even her. How much more interesting would it have been for Chrysalis to be leading the rebels to stop the Umbrum out of mutual interest, then escapes in the end while the Princesses are busy saving Sombra?
The Umbrum pretty much hijacked Sombra as the villains of the arc, which was weak, making Sombra seem like a puppet to a new villain instead of his own character. The crux of his character arc falls flat because at no time prior to this issue did Sombra seem hesitant, remorseful, or guilty with what he had done previously, it's only now that the writers remembered to give him the depth he was given in Fiendship is Magic. Hope's epiphany is likewise pathetic because she should have come to it at least two issues ago.
For the ending, while it doesn't work because of the bad pacing and characterization... I was surprised at them leaving Sombra alive. I pegged him to get drawn into the Umbrum world and Hope goes with him to be with him. The comics never impact the show significantly, any major villain introduced is defeated before the end of their arc. Here, however, Sombra survives and he and Hope are around. I doubt the show will use them anytime soon, but I wouldn't mind seeing Sombra come back, he's a bucketload of story potential now. I also like the juxtaposition with Reflections - not only does Sombra look like the good Sombra in the other world, just with a different cape color, but him turning good at the end of this issue nicely reflections the good Sombra being corrupted at the end of Reflections. It makes sense with how events between worlds seem to parallel each other.
Overall, while I welcome the idea of Sombra's return and redemption, the arc did a terrible job of executing it. Let us move on and take away nothing more from this story than the potential to see the Crystal King return again someday.
I had really high hopes for this arc, given how good the tie in material was leading into it (Sombra's and Chrysalis' Fiendship is Magic parts). Alas, it seems that the story wasn't planned out to use its characters to their full potential and so padding was introduced in order to make four comics out of it. Padding in the form of extra villains that did nothing for their characters and in fact only hurt them. That's sadly what people are going to remember, the League of Not Quite Villainous Villains and how useless they were after just one issue.
Sombra's character I thought was fine, if a little underwhelming towards the end. It's Radiant Hope that just sticks in my craw. She got everything she wanted and not a single good guy called her out for all the trouble she caused. Since everything turned out fine, I guess the princesses just shrugged looked the other way.
It's this lack of consequences for a character's actions that I think is really starting to grate on the fandom as a whole. Ponies like Starlight Glimmer and Radiant Hope are given a free pass because they're cute, I suppose. The comics have a chance to break free from the PG restrictions that the show has to follow and yet they don't take advantage of that.
I'm really starting to fear that the show and comics are stagnating. Let's hope season 6 and some of the Friendship Forever comics coming up prove me wrong.
I figured Sombra would be brought back. He's in the Gameloft game.
This comic is also the main reason why I hope we see Lightning Dust in Season 6.
Just read all of it, and I had many of the same gripes you did. But, I dunno, I found Sombra and Hope's part of the story enjoyable and rather liked the ending. And I think Sombra was showing a little remorse, or at least hesitation at the end of part 3. You know, before Twilight came and wrecked it.
Could they have done a better job? Certainly. Like the show, I think this suffers from having limitations put on it. 25 pages per issue. Though it could have been fixed by making it maybe a 5 or 6 parter instead. But again, I found Sombra and Hope's story enjoyable and touching. Perhaps it's the sad, hopeless romantic in me. Honestly, I'm inspired to try and make a better retelling of it somewhere down the line.
Me, IMO, I sadly hated this arc. It was a big waste of time and potential, especially with Hope's character; IMO she is the worst MLP character, but that's just my opinion.
I also was sad that IMO Fiendship #1 got ruined for me.
3645397 I wouldn't worry too much about the show, though it did have a weak ending, season 5 was still good. Hope they don't screw up something like redemption in the show (Starlight's was better as she showed regretful expressions while Hope did not)...
I unfortunately can't say the same about the comics. Yeah, I hated Hope too.
One other thing; the Reflections thing kinda wouldn't make sense because then Celestia and Luna would have to start being evil. Or we're probably supposed to forget about Reflections...